State Advocacy

Current: SC Department of Transportation (SCDOT)

In 2019, we are actively working to advance a state Complete Streets, or Multimodal, policy at SCDOT. The SCDOT is the decision making body that passes SCDOT policy. The PCC facilitates a broad Alliance called the SC Livable Communities Alliance, to advance a state policy that will improve state-local coordination so Livable Streets Built for People can be realized for everyone. The steering committee for this Alliance is PCC, AARP, SC Alliance of YMCA’s, American Heart Association – SC, East Smart Move More SC, ABLE South Carolina, Coastal Conservation League, and the SC Disability and Health Project). The campaign website is here; get involved today!.

The 2003 SCDOT Bike/Ped Resolution should be implemented via an SCDOT commission policy that contains a standard process, updated Design Standards, and a Safe Systems planning approach for sake of equity.

This initiative is now 5 years in the making, and for the last 3 years, we engaged SCDOT for this real state policy change and introduced them to the growing partnership with goals well beyond the PCC mission. We are working at the grassroots level and with each decision maker to communicate the value of the issue and policy to people across our entire state.

After studying the issue and its impact within every county of SC, we know how and to what extent our entire state is affected. We are currently working at the grassroots level, to schedule our various voices to be heard, in various opportunities to communicate this policy campaign to the decision makers.

Past: State Agency initiatives:

In 2014, our efforts with the SCDOT Multi Modal Transportation Plan (MMTP) paid off, since this agency now utilizes a singular database for all local bike plans. We grew a Coalition that submitted recommendationsfor this and other successes.

In the past, PCC worked to improve many SCDOT policies and move the needle on innovations coming from the local level experiencing challenges in a highway department, but with limited results (Rumble Strips).

Every 5 years, the SCDOT and SC Department of Public Safety (SCDPS) collaboratively develop aStrategic Highway Safety Plan. The PCC was a member of the statewide committee that contributed to the last Plan, and we hope to do this again. The committee collaboratively develops the mitigation strategies for known traffic safety problems on South Carolina urban and rural state owned roadways. In 2014, PCC and partners submitted our recommendations, based on broad collaboration, to the bike and pedestrian-related crash mitigation measures, and many comments became part of the 5 year plan. Defined strategies are eventually used to form state funding decisions, such as guardrails to mitigate run-off-the-road crashes, sidewalks for pedestrian crashes, bike lanes for bike-related crashes, education for bike safety, and a host of other strategies aimed at reducing crashes, injuries and fatalities of all road users.